An Angel for the Earl by Barbara Metzger

Author:Barbara Metzger [Metzger, Barbara]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FICTION
ISBN: 9781611871425
Publisher: Untreed Reads Publishing
Published: 2011-08-08T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirteen

The Earl of Stanford awoke in a better frame of mind in a too-short bed in a guest chamber, but at least the fireplace there worked. He threatened the butler and two footmen with instant dismissal if the chimney in his own room was not repaired by nightfall, he demanded an interview with his mother for that afternoon, and he sent a frigidly formal note to Goldy Flint via his new secretary, requesting an accounting. And all of this before his kippers and eggs. The earl was ready to greet John’s brother Ralph at nine in the morning. In London he’d never be out of bed, sometimes not yet in bed.

He took a deep breath on his way to the stables. Yes, even his head was clear. What a relief it was just knowing Johnny was going to be there to help with decisions, Sidwell to handle the details, and Lucy to…well, be Lucy. He was used to her, kept peering around corners and sniffing the air for a hint of her presence.

Ralph Norris was thrilled with the idea of owning Stanford’s hunters and was prepared to come down heavy for them. He’d even brought cash. The grooms paraded each of the horses out of the stable block and around the ring, and Ralph turned down only a chestnut gelding that had shown some swelling just that morning.

“Save that one for when you hunt with Westcott,” he advised Kerry. “The man’s hunt-crazy. That’s the way to get to his girl.”

“I’m not interested in getting to any—” Kerry began, but Ralph wasn’t listening. He was staring at the bays, the perfectly matched, record-setting, bang-up-to-the-bits pair that drew the earl’s rig.

“I’ve got to have them, Stanford. And the curricle. I promised the wife we’d go make a stir in London after the baby’s born. We had to cut the honeymoon short. Morning sickness, don’t you know,” he said proudly, making sure the earl was aware he’d gotten his bride in her current interesting condition on their wedding night.

The bays were just what Ralph needed, he decided. The price he offered was hard for a badly dipped man to refuse, especially when Ralph hinted he mightn’t take the hunters if he couldn’t have the bays.

Kerry looked at his bays again, and then at all the grooms standing about with long faces as they watched their positions being sold off.

The earl could do some bargaining of his own. If he was going to see his horses go, he may as well see the end of some other mouths to feed. “I’ll part with the bays, Ralph, on one condition: you take on the stable staff that I won’t be needing. You’ll require extra men now, and you’ll have to have them bring the horses over anyway.”

No amount of bargaining or blackmailing could get Ralph to make the mixed breed Lucky part of the deal. The untrained mutt kept jumping up on the earl, leaving stable-dirt footprints on Kerry’s Hessians. The dog’s barking disturbed

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